


The Great Pastry Chouxdown

by soufflegirl91



Series: Souffle's 007 Fest 2020 Fancreations [2]
Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Baked Goods, Domesticity, Established Relationship, Fluff and Humour, M/M, Trainwreck in the kitchen, never make a bet with Tanner
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:54:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25017319
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/soufflegirl91/pseuds/soufflegirl91
Summary: Q should not have spoken so scathingly of the Great British Bake Off. Especially not in front of Bill who, he suspected, had built a small shrine to Paul Hollywood in his kitchen.(When an ill-advised bet leads to Q baking the world’s fiddliest recipe, it’s a recipe for disaster)
Relationships: James Bond/Q
Series: Souffle's 007 Fest 2020 Fancreations [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1809892
Comments: 37
Kudos: 62
Collections: 007 Fest Fancreations





	1. Sunday

**Author's Note:**

  * For [christinefromsherwood](https://archiveofourown.org/users/christinefromsherwood/gifts).



> Credit for Fish the cat goes to Anyawen for having a cat named Fish. I liked it, so I borrowed it. Also, I have never made choux pastry, caramel or creme patissiere in my life, so I have no idea if croquembouche is easier or more difficult than I have made it sound here. Bake at your own risk. 
> 
> The first... about 500 words of this fic were written by the wonderful Christinefromsherwood, way back in February when we decided that doing our own finish-this-february fics would be a good idea. Alas, life interfered, and this is the first of those fics to be completed. You may one day see my results for Mely's intro, and Christine and Mely's results for mine and each other's. Who knows what the Fest will bring. 
> 
> As always, eternal thanks to Christine for being the best beta in existence.

“...boil until hard-crack…” Q blinked at the page, pushing his glasses up his nose. He tried to say it again differently, hoping to find some more meaning in the words: “ _ Boil _ until hard-crack. Boil until  _ hard-crack _ . Boil  _ until _ hard-  _ What does that mean _ ?!” 

At his loud shout, Birdie gave an annoyed chirp from her position on the second kitchen counter. 

“Oh I’m sorry, am I disturbing your non-stop, all-day sleep? This is a crisis, Birdie!” His cat however, continued to look wholly unimpressed and, giving a dispassionate yawn, she stretched and bounced off the counter to pad away and continue her slumber on some other cushioned surface of the flat. 

Q dug his fingers into his hair and screamed soundlessly. 

It was his own damn fault. He knew that. He owned that. He was more than well aware. 

He should not have spoken so scathingly of the Great British Bake Off. Especially not in front of Bill who, he suspected, had built a small shrine to Paul Hollywood in his kitchen. But Q  _ had _ had a few beers and he was so sick of there being nothing on TV except whodunits and cooking shows, and sure, maybe he had never actually watched the show, or baked himself, and the words:  _ “Oh for fuck’s sake, I wish everyone would stop banging on about Susan’s piping and Uzoma’s fantastic flavours. They have a recipe. They follow the recipe. Anyone can do that.” _ did leave his mouth, but the point was... Well, there were extenuating circumstances, was the point.

Q would have liked to be able to say that he regretted it instantly. He didn’t. 

He didn’t regret it when Bill’s face did that pinched thing like when he was pissed at Financial for not approving his requisition for 3-ply toilet paper. He didn’t regret it when Eve widened her eyes at him and tried to mime that he should cut it out. He didn’t regret it even when Bill smiled at him suddenly in a very sweet and serene way and said: “Well then, how about a bet?” 

For explanation, see above: a couple of beers.

But he did regret it the next morning when he woke up to an email from Bill with the recipe for a classic French  _ croquembouche _ and remembered the conditions of their bet.

Since baking was simply a matter of following a recipe, he was asked to put his money where his mouth was and make any dessert Bill chose, following Bill’s instructions and seeking no information whatsoever elsewhere. 

Q couldn’t think back without wanting to kick past, drunk Q’s arse for his idiocy. Because even after hearing that, he thought it was a good idea to respond with: “Pfffft. Piece of cake.” If it hadn’t been for that, Q would now simply go to Bill, say: “Sorry, mate. My bad,” and give him his money. But he couldn’t do that now, could he? Because his blasé attitude prompted Bill to smirk evilly and “make it really interesting, then.” 

And now Q had to make a classic fucking croquembouche for his anniversary dinner with James on Thursday and he wasn’t allowed serve anything else and “oh don’t worry, Q, I know the chef at  _ Le chat chartreux _ , they’ll know you’re bringing your own dessert.” 

_ Fuck _ .

It wasn’t even like he could go and  _ buy _ the damn thing from somewhere else and pass it off as homemade for the restaurant. 

Bill would know. 

Bill  _ always _ knew. The man had some sort of built-in radar for shop-bought foodstuffs being passed off as homemade. At their last Macmillan coffee morning, Mandy in Accounts Payable had tried to pass off a Tesco Victoria sponge as her own and Bill had shamed her out of the fundraising team. 

Of course, Q wasn’t naive or stupid enough to try to buy a fucking croquembouche at  _ Tesco _ , but there must be somewhere that Bill didn’t know about. Maybe somewhere outside the city? No, there was no way Q would be able to manoeuvre a tower of bloody choux pastry on public transport without Bill finding out. Getting it delivered was out of the question, too. He couldn’t even  _ glance _ at a profiterole without Bill knowing. 

And people thought  _ Q _ was the one with eyes and ears everywhere!

Q groaned.

He was bloody stuck. 

He resisted the urge to thump his head against the top cupboard. 

He was bloody  _ stuck _ with a bloody recipe that, if it even worked, would take  _ six bloody hours! _

Resigning himself to the fact that this was apparently his life now, and making a mental note to  _ never make a drunken bet with Bill Tanner ever again, no really, I mean it this time _ , Q let out the sigh to end all sighs and turned back to the print-out Bill had  _ oh-so-kindly _ slipped through his letterbox while Q was still in bed with a hangover. 

At least, he mused, he hadn’t been stupid enough to start following the recipe without reading to the end. Q still hadn’t seen a single episode of Bake Off, but even he knew that getting ahead of yourself when cooking only led to disaster.

Not that this was going to be anything  _ other _ than a disaster. 

For a start, he didn’t even own half of the equipment or ingredients. Why on earth would Bill assume that Q owned a  _ piping bag _ ?! He and James only owned one large baking tray, which was perfectly sufficient for their day-to-day life, but  _ noooooo _ , Q needed  _ at least _ two for this recipe, not to mention an additional small saucepan. Who owned a digital cooking thermometer, anyway?! If all of that wasn’t enough, he apparently needed to clear enough space in his freezer for 24 profiteroles to freeze just for the sake of three measly hours. 

And for the love of all that was holy,  _ what kind of recipe uses 11 eggs?! _

For  _ two _ people! Even if the bloody thing worked, what the hell was he meant to do with the leftovers?! James didn’t even really  _ like _ desserts! 

So, in summary: Q was never allowed to make a bet with Bill ever again, he was stuck baking a recipe he had never even  _ heard of _ , let alone seen before, and even if it worked, the results would be completely pointless. 

And if it didn’t work…

Well, that was the problem, wasn’t it? If the bet was purely for financial gain, then Q would have sucked it up and forked over the money as soon as he’d emerged from his hungover cocoon. 

But it hadn’t. 

They had decided to make it  _ interesting _ . 

‘Interesting’, in the context of MI6’s not-so-secret betting pool, almost always meant ‘public humiliation’. Of course, no one was ever really mean-spirited about it, and if it had simply been a matter of Q conveniently forgetting his spare trousers so that when Bill ‘accidentally’ spilled tea on him, he had to walk around Q branch in just his pants, he would have gritted his teeth and lived with it. 

Not that Bill  _ would _ make that bet, Bill had no interest in seeing Q semi-naked, but Q really wouldn’t put it past James or Eve. Heavens knew Q himself had once won a bet with Trevelyan that resulted in 006 testing prototype guns shirtless for a day. The man really did have abs of steel. It was great for Q branch morale, if not for productivity. 

There would be no ill-advised nudity this time. 

Because they had all been drunk and over-confident, Bill and Q had left the terms of their bet up to  _ Eve. _ Q  _ seriously _ considered going tee-total from now on. 

If Q won, and he was under no illusion that he would, Bill would have to sing a Disney princess karaoke medley at the office Halloween party. 

If Q _lost_ , and he was pretty certain that this was the way things would go, he’d have to _slow dance_ _with James in front of everyone at the party_. For two years, they had both been careful to keep things strictly professional in front of colleagues and now they’d be slow dancing in front of them to _Can You Feel the Love Tonight_ from The Lion King! 

Why had Bill picked that particular song? Because fuck Q’s life, that’s why. 

In conclusion?

“Fuck. This is going to be a fucking disaster.” 

It was Sunday morning. He had four and a half days. Maybe he would be able to pull off a baking miracle. 


	2. Wednesday

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one goes out for Food Day in 007 Fest :D Thanks as ever to Christine for the beta!

Q was not going to pull off a baking miracle. 

His plans to use Sunday afternoon and his day off on Monday to do a miniature trial run before James was due back from a mission were promptly scuppered when, just after returning from the shops with all of the ingredients and equipment he required, he was called into MI6 for an emergency. Q then spent the next eighteen hours trying to get 007 safely out of the metaphorical lion’s den in Kinshasa, and so by the time he’d briefed M and got home again, all he wanted to do was eat and sleep before returning to his usual shift on Tuesday morning. 

When James arrived home on Tuesday evening, he had distracted Q with an early celebration in bed, leaving him too distracted to bring up the impending end to their dignity as a couple. No one’s dignity could survive slow dancing to bloody Disney songs, not even James Bond. 

“Fuck.”

Q knew that he was beginning to sound like a broken record, but honestly, _shit_ didn’t even begin to convey how he felt about Bill, the bet, and baking. If it wasn’t for James Bond, Q would seriously consider swearing off all things beginning with the letter B. Who needed beer and bread, anyway?! 

Now here he was, on Wednesday evening, staring once again at the stupid piece of paper that held Q’s dignity, and possibly his relationship, in its metaphorical hands. Q _knew_ in his heart of hearts, that James would never leave him over something so stupid as dancing in public. He knew that he was being ridiculous, but he couldn’t help worrying that it would be _this_ that made James change his mind. Things had gone so well over the past two years, it was like waiting for the other shoe to drop. 

Shaking his head to get those negative thoughts out of his mind, Q turned his attention back to the subject at hand. 

Come hell or high water, he would make these damned balls of pastry tonight if it killed him. Anything that required “2 or 3 hours in the freezer to chill” could bloody well be left in there overnight! Q was only working a half-day tomorrow to make up for his lost day off, he’d simply get them out when he got home from work and they could defrost while he was making the caramel. 

It would be easy. 

_\- Step 1: Crème Pâtissière -_

Of course, Bill bloody Tanner couldn’t allow Q to fill his profiteroles with whipped cream like everybody else, oh no. It was fancy bloody custard all the way! 

Q was not a particular fan of custard in his adult life, thanks to school dinner memories of bowls full of a watery imitation of the stuff drowning tiny pieces of dry cake. For this reason, he had never made custard from scratch. On the rare occasion he did want some, a tub of Ambrosia did the job just as well. Faced with Bill’s less-than-helpful recipe, Q really, really wished he had made some before. If only so that he knew what it should _look like_ . Even Q knew that homemade custard wasn’t _that_ shade of yellow! 

Having read through the relevant section of the recipe a few times to make sure he would remember it, Q placed a pan of milk on the stove to heat and measured out the rest of his ingredients. Separating the egg yolks was a lot more fiddly than he had anticipated, and the yolk of the first egg he tried just broke immediately. Setting that one aside for the pastry later, he had more luck with the rest. Q was busy whisking the egg yolks together with the dry ingredients (how smooth did “until smooth” have to be, anyway?!) when he remembered the milk. 

The recipe had said to _warm the milk over a low heat until it just begins to steam._

Q’s milk was boiling.

 _Fuck_. 

Well, it was simply a matter of too much heat, Q thought as he fished out the skin that had formed on the top. He would just take it off the heat and leave it to cool for a minute or two. 

No harm done. 

Once the milk had stopped bubbling and vast plumes of steam had settled down into vague wisps, Q continued following the recipe. Pouring half of the hot milk into the egg mixture, he whisked until his elbow felt like it might actually drop off. Q gave a mental shrug, deciding that elbow pain was a sign it was mixed enough. He returned the milk pan to the heat and poured the milky-egg mixture back into the pan. 

_Stir constantly for a couple of minutes until thickened,_ the recipe stated. 

Well. That was… vague. 

How long was a _couple of minutes_?

How thick was _thickened?_

What did _constantly_ even mean? Bill hadn’t exactly included a recommended RPM for stirring. Did he mean slow and constant or fast and constant? Was Q just supposed to _guess_?! 

Deciding to cross his fingers and hope for the best, he set to stirring. Mentally counting down from 120 (a _couple_ usually meant around two, right?!), he worked through the aching elbow, taking all his frustrations about Bill and this bloody stupid bet out on the poor, innocent custard. By the time his mental countdown reached zero, Q was out of breath. He stopped stirring, and examined his efforts. 

Yep, it had certainly thickened. 

It was… really very thick, actually. 

The recipe _had_ said everything should combine, it just… hadn’t specified whether it was supposed to combine into a gelatinous lump around the spoon. 

But it had thickened! 

Riding the high of his success, Q took the pan off the hob and set about stirring in the vanilla extract. His feeling of accomplishment soon vanished as he realised the liquid vanilla just didn’t want to mix in with the custard blob. Still, he transferred the mixture into a plastic bowl and shoved it in the fridge to chill. 

It would have to do. 

_\- Step 2: Choux Pastry -_

The slamming of the front door startled Q as just he was spooning the last couple of pastry balls onto the tray. 

“Q? You in?”

“In here.” Q called back to James, attention still focused on the beige globs that were supposed to magically transform into profiteroles when baked. 

Q had his doubts about that. 

If these bastard pastries actually worked, Q would almost, _almost_ be willing to do a Disney karaoke session of his own. 

First, he had _probably_ burned the butter, forgetting that he needed to add 2 cups of water to the pan until the butter was already brown and bubbling. 

Then, he had been a bit overzealous with the whisking and managed to get flour _everywhere._ He was pretty certain he still had some in his hair. 

Adding the eggs had, remarkably, gone smoothly. He couldn’t see any lumps in the mixture, and although he didn’t know what the consistency was _supposed_ to be, it seemed thick enough to spoon into the required balls of dough. 

The recipe had said 24, but somehow Q had ended up with 29. At least that would give him a few extras just in case he had a caramel disaster tomorrow. 

“What _are_ you doing?” James asked as he stepped into the kitchen and took in the scene. “I didn’t even know we _owned_ this many utensils.” 

“We didn’t. I bought them on Sunday,” Q replied absentmindedly, overseeing his handiwork one last time before opening the oven door and carefully placing the trays inside. 

_30 to 35 minutes_ , the recipe had said. Q decided to split the difference and set the timer for 33. 

Stepping away from the oven as carefully as he would an armed bomb, Q let out a long breath. 

“How was the briefing?” He finally turned his attention to James, who was still standing in the doorway. 

Staring.

“What?” Q asked, defensively. 

“You have flour all over yourself.” 

Q huffed, running a hand through his hair and sending a shower of white powder everywhere. He let out a frustrated groan and glared balefully at James when he had the gall to smirk at him. 

“Here. You missed a bit.”

James stepped right up into Q’s space, pressing him against the kitchen counter. Q reached for him as James raised his hand, cupping Q’s jaw. Instinctively, Q leaned into the palm. James brushed Q’s cheek with his thumb, and tilted his head in close. 

Q’s eyes fluttered closed, expectantly.

“There,” James said, stepping back. “Much better.”

_What?!_

Q opened his eyes. 

James Bond was standing there, wiping his floury thumb on his pristine suit trousers and _grinning_ like a lunatic! 

“What.” 

James’s shoulders started shaking, his beautiful blue eyes twinkling, and _how dare he!_

“Are you _laughing_ at me?!” 

James, the _bastard_ , snorted. Which turned into a guffaw. Which then turned into full-blown belly laughing, leaning on the counter to support himself. 

“James Andrew Bond! How dare you laugh at me when I am _baking_ for you!” 

Faced with the full name treatment, James at least made a token effort to stifle his laughter, but his eyes still shone with mirth. 

“I’m sorry, darling,” he said, sounding anything but sorry. “But you really should see yourself. It looks like a bakery exploded all over you…”

James trailed off, laughing again. 

Q crossed his arms and glowered. 

It was _not_ funny! 

Q had put _hours_ of his life into this stupid baking project. Hours he could have been coding, or snuggling with Birdie and Fish, or working on his _actual_ gift for James. Instead he had been trying to figure out this bloody stupid recipe, and trying not to fuck it up because he didn’t want to put James through the consequences! 

And James was just… _laughing_ at him! Laughing so hard he had tears streaming out of his stupid eyes, and his ridiculous ears had gone bright pink! 

It was rude! 

It was unfair! 

It was _bloody adorable!_

Despite himself, Q could feel his own lips twitching upwards.

“I got a bit too forceful with the whisk,” he admitted sheepishly.

James’s laughter finally petered out, though he still grinned fondly at Q. 

“I can see that. What brought this on?” 

Ah. That. Q still hadn’t told James about the bet. 

“What, I’m not allowed to do something nice for our anniversary?” 

“You are,” James conceded. “Only, your idea of _nice_ is usually a new toy. Like the exploding cufflinks for our first anniversary, or last Christmas when you made that thing-”

“Ok, you’re right!” Q cut him off, flushing. That _had_ been a memorable night. Q could still feel it for days, after. “Maybe I just wanted to try something different this year.” 

James frowned at him suspiciously, but evidently decided not to push the issue. Their anniversary was tomorrow, after all, and he would soon see if Q had made him a proper gift. 

Q had. It was bloody brilliant, even if he did say so himself. 

“Well, seeing as you went to all the trouble of baking,” James said flirtatiously, crowding Q back against the counter again and leaning in for a brief, tender kiss. “The least I can do is help you get all that flour out of your hair.”

James went in for another kiss, and Q responded gladly. When they pulled apart for air, Q frowned to see a smattering of flour on the shoulder of James’s lovely charcoal grey suit. He really _did_ need a shower. And if James was offering...

Q glanced at the timer on the oven. 26 minutes left. Plenty of time. 

_Beep-beep… beep-beep… beep-beep_

James and Q had just turned off the water after a very _relaxing_ shower, when the trill of the oven timer cut through their satisfied silence. 

“Shit! The pastry!” 

Q hurriedly wrapped a towel around his hips and grabbed his glasses before rushing to the kitchen. He punched the timer, grabbed his oven gloves and yanked open the oven door. 

A large plume of steam wafted out, making his glasses steam up. Shoving them up over his forehead, Q grabbed the baking trays and set them down with a clatter Then he cleaned his glasses. 

They weren’t _burnt_ , but they were… perhaps a _little bit_ well-done. Certainly a darker shade of brown than one usually expected in choux pastry. Even Q could see that. 

“Fuck!” Q slammed the oven door shut. “Fuck fuck _fuck!_ ”

“Q?” James sounded concerned. “Is everything ok?” 

He rattled around in the utensil drawer, pulled out a spatula and then shoved it closed with a bang. He paused for a moment, glaring at his overcooked profiteroles. James stepped up to him and gently took hold of his arms before he could go after them with his spatula. 

“What’s wrong?” He looked so genuinely worried that Q just wanted to _cry_. 

“It needs to _fucking_ work!” Q blurted out, angry and frustrated. This _fucking_ bet! 

“Q,” James soothed, rubbing his hands up and down Q’s arms. “Breathe, love. It’s just a bit of pastry. It’s hardly the end of the world.”

 _Damn him_ for being so calm! Didn’t he _know_ what was at stake?!

That was rather the point, wasn’t it? James _didn’t_ know. Q still hadn’t told him. 

He winced.

“Promise you won’t be mad?” 

In the first few months of their relationship, a question like that would have had James standing to attention, any warmth in his eyes sliding away to be hidden by that cold, expressionless 007 mask. They had miraculously swerved a number of roadblocks thrown up by James Bond’s trust issues that could have easily derailed their relationship if either one of them had been less invested in making it work. 

Now, after two years together - most of that spent living together when James was in the country - Q was gratified to see James simply quirk his brows in suspicion, lips still twisted in a half-smile. 

“Why would I be mad at you?”

“Eve, Bill and I went out for drinks on Friday. I _may_ have had a bit too much to drink.” 

“Ok…” Suspicion morphed into confusion. “Why would I be mad at you for that? I can hardly berate anyone for their alcohol consumption.” 

That was a fair point.

“Bill and I… made a bet.” 

Q’s eyes flickered around the room, avoiding looking James in the eye. 

“ _You_ made a drunken bet with Tanner?” James scoffed, but a closer look at Q’s mortified expression sobered him. “Q, haven’t you learned _never_ to make a bet with Bill Tanner?”

“I knoooowww!” he moaned, hiding his face in James’s shoulder. “I was very, _very_ drunk, and then I bad-mouthed Bake Off-”

“Ouch.” James didn’t even try to hide his sarcastic wince. Q smacked him lightly on the shoulder in retaliation. 

“And Bill knew it was our anniversary this week, and he bet that I couldn’t follow this recipe, and _really_ , I didn’t know what a fucking croquembouche even was!” 

James’s eyebrows rose in disbelief and he let out a bark of laughter.

“ _You_ bet Tanner that you could bake a _croquembouche?!_ Q, you can’t even bake a bloody shop bought pie!” 

“Yes, I know that!” Q hissed waspishly. “Did you not hear me when I said I was very, very drunk?!” 

James sobered, his tone turned soothing.

“Ok, so you’ll just give him the money. It isn’t worth all this stress, darling.” 

James’s hand was stroking Q’s hair, and it was lovely, it really was, but…

“We didn’t bet for money,” Q mumbled. 

James sighed. His hand stopped stroking. Q would miss the stroking. Q felt his heart bursting with love and shame as James dropped a light kiss on his head, before James took Q’s shoulders firmly and pushed him just far enough away so that Q was forced to look him in the eye.

“Q,” James began, his tone serious, but his eyes still shone with warmth. Q thought he would miss those eyes. “What did you bet on that wasn’t money, that has you all worked up about choux pastry?”

“If I win, Bill has to sing Disney princess karaoke at the halloween party…” he trailed off.

“And if you _lose?_ ” 

“... you and I have to slow dance at the party.” 

James frowned, confused.

“I know we don’t make a big show of affection in public, Q, but surely one dance isn’t the end of the world.”

Q took a deep breath.

“We have to dance to Can You Feel The Love Tonight!” he blurted out, and squeezed his eyes shut so that he didn’t have to see the moment James fell out of love with him because of his own drunken stupidity. 

James sighed. 

Oh, God. This was it. 

His hands tightened their grip on Q’s shoulders slightly. 

Was he really _that_ mad?! Q really hadn’t thought through the perils of making an assassin fall out of love with you.

James pulled Q closer, wrapping his arms around Q’s back and hugging him.

…. _wait, what?!_

“What?” 

James chuckled warmly. Q felt his body shaking, felt the vibration against his cheek.

“Well, it’s not what I’d have _chosen_ to dance to, but I’m sure my pride will get over it.” 

Q let out the breath he didn’t know he was holding, previously-unnoticed tension seeped from his shoulders. 

“Though maybe we should at least _try_ to win. Now, what do you need to do next?” 

Q pulled away from the comfort of James’s chest in order to kiss him. It was a very _thorough_ sort of kiss that, Q hoped, conveyed all the gratitude and love he didn’t quite have the words for right now. 

“The profiteroles need to cool before filling them. Then they need to go in the freezer overnight so that I can make the caramel tomorrow.” 

“If you say so, chef,” James said with a fond smirk, taking the spatula out of Q’s unresisting hand and deftly transferring the pastry balls from baking tray to the cooling rack. 

Q could have sworn he felt his heart skip a beat. 

_This_ was why he had fallen in love with James Bond. 

Not his (admittedly _fantastic_ ) seduction skills, or his fitted suits. Not even those ice blue eyes or his endearingly large ears. It was the way he would do whatever he could to help the people he loved, be it escorting Eve to political functions so that the handsy Whitehall establishment creeps wouldn’t hit on her, or helping Q with a baking attempt that they both knew was never going to work. 


	3. Thursday

“-it, shit, shit!  _ Fucking _ budget meetings!” 

The door slammed shut behind him as Q entered the flat. Trying to both toe off his shoes  _ and _ hang up his coat and laptop bag at the same time, he only succeeded in losing his balance - only a helpful hand appearing out of the living room stopped him from ending up in a sprawled heap on the floor. 

“If you could  _ try _ not to end up in A&E on our anniversary, darling, I would appreciate it.” 

Regaining his equilibrium, Q straightened, turning in James’s grasp to give him an affectionate hello kiss. 

“Mmmm, I’ll try,” he conceded with a second peck on the lips for good measure, “but no promises. I still need to make the bloody caramel.”

“Here’s a hint: don’t dip your finger in to test the temperature.” 

James grinned impishly, and Q gave him a prod in the stomach in retaliation. 

“I think I could have figured that one out for myself, thanks.”

James followed Q into the kitchen before filling the kettle and putting it on to boil. Whenever James was home first, he always made Q a pot of Earl Grey when he got in. Q headed straight to the freezer to retrieve last night’s questionable attempt at profiteroles. 

In the light of a new day they looked… well, a little over-browned, but on the whole they looked right - oh, who was Q kidding, he had no idea how to judge pastry!

Placing them on the side to defrost, Q headed towards their bedroom to get changed. He brushed his hand against James’s back as he passed in a wordless gesture of thanks.

_ \- Step 3: Caramel -  _

When he returned to the kitchen in an old t-shirt and pyjama bottoms (the outfit he had planned for dinner tonight could wait until  _ after _ any potential caramel disasters), James handed him a mug of tea and Bill’s recipe. 

Q sighed. Best to get it over with.

“I took the liberty of getting the equipment and ingredients ready for you.” 

James tried to play it off as a serious act of kindness, but Q could see the laughter in his eyes. For a spy, James was terrible at hiding his feelings in the comfort of their flat. (Secretly, Q felt a swell of affection any time this happened, because he knew it meant James letting his guard down.)

“I’m sure I would have managed to find the sugar and a saucepan myself.” He patted James on the shoulder in sarcastically. “Though your efforts are appreciated nonetheless.”

Despite his joking, Q really did appreciate the fact that James had not only measured out the sugar into the saucepan, he had also filled a cup with the required amount of water for the caramel, placed a metal spoon within easy reach and, on closer look, had filled the sink with cold water ready to cool the pan later. 

Whether the croquembouche worked or not, James was  _ definitely _ getting his real anniversary present later. Q might even consider doing that  _ thing  _ James liked…

… but he was getting ahead of himself. They needed to make it to the restaurant first.  _ With  _ the croquembouche. 

Q took another look at the recipe to make sure he knew what he was doing and promptly swore when he realised what the next step was.

“Fuck. What the bloody fuck is hard-crack?!” 

A sudden thought occurred to him. He wasn’t allowed to seek any information  _ elsewhere, _ but James knew a lot about fancy cooking techniques. And he was in the flat with Q. Q didn’t need to physically or digitally  _ look for _ the information,  _ therefore _ , it didn’t count. He was merely… asking for a definition. What Bill didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him. 

“James,” he called out into the living room where the man in question had settled himself with Fish on his lap and an open book, “what do you know about making caramel?”

James looked up, eyebrows bunched suspiciously. The hand not holding the book stopped stroking Fish under the chin, but he ignored the paw she batted at him.

“I thought I wasn’t allowed to help you.”

“You aren’t, but I don’t understand the bloody recipe. What the hell is hard-crack? All I can think about is crack cocaine, and I’m pretty sure they don’t make caramel out of that!” 

James laughed at the idea. 

“Hard-crack just means that if you drop a ball of caramel in cold water, it will go hard straight away. If you try to bend it, the caramel will crack rather than bend easily.” 

Well. That made sense. 

“Huh.” 

As Q turned back towards the kitchen, James shook his head with a smile, no doubt fondly judging his lover’s baking ineptitude. 

_ \- Step 4: Assemble the Croquembouche -  _

The caramel…

The caramel was…

The less said about the caramel, the better. 

Q’s  _ first _ attempt had sailed straight past hard-crack stage and into set-the-smoke-alarm-off territory. In hindsight, it was probably a good job Q had picked up that extra saucepan, because this one was definitely a lost cause. 

Once James had stopped laughing at him over his failure, he agreed to supervise Q’s second attempt. This one was at least recognisable as caramel, even if it had still ended up crystallizing a little. It probably wasn’t going to drizzle nicely, but at this stage Q would be happy if it stuck to the pastry at all.

The pastry.

That was the other problem. 

Q, in his world of computers and logic, had assumed that as the profiteroles needed freezing for three hours, he could safely freeze them overnight and defrost them in time to put the damn thing together. Apparently, that was not the case. Instead of coming out of the freezer cold and firm, they had defrosted  _ soggy. _

“I am never drinking again!” Q declared, on the verge of tears. 

He attempted to drizzle grainy caramel over a profiterole. It glooped, sadly. Q decided it was good enough.

“It’s not as bad as all that,” James soothed him, passing over the next soggy ball. “You should see some of the things they end up with in the technical challenges on Bake Off.”

Q paused in the act of drizzling (really more like  _ dolloping _ ) caramel to glare at James over the rim of his glasses.

“James Bond, don’t you dare mention that infernal programme in my presence ever again!” 

Q hadn’t even  _ known _ that James watched Bake Off during his time off duty. 

“Duly noted.”

One by one, pathetic pastry followed by globs of caramel, the tower took shape. It was a wonky shape, more Crooked Spire than Eiffel Tower, but by some miracle it remained upright. As he placed the last profiterole on the top of the teetering pile and stepped back.

“The recipe says to drizzle the rest of the caramel over the top to form a ‘cobweb of spun sugar’, but frankly I think it’s a lost cause by this point.” 

“It’s not  _ that _ bad?” James examined the poor excuse for a croquembouche with a critical eye. 

Q glanced at him, unimpressed.

“Did you intend for that to be a question, or did it just come out that way?” 

James shrugged.

“You’re right, it looks terrible.”

Q buried his face in his hands.

“We’re doomed,” came the muffled voice from underneath his palms. 

James pulled Q’s hands away from his mouth, pressing a kiss on each palm as he did so. 

“You  _ tried _ . Tanner probably wasn’t expecting even that much. Besides, you never know, it might taste great.” 

James tried for an encouraging smile, but Q just gave him a sceptical look.

“Come on, leave it for now. It’s time to get ready. You and I are going to have a  _ wonderful _ anniversary dinner, followed by a questionable dessert-”

Q snorted.

“- and  _ that _ will be followed by a rather more delightful form of  _ dessert _ when we get back.” 

Q shivered, and James grinned seductively. 

_ \- Step 5: Serve and enjoy! -  _

It turned out that transporting a croquembouche in the boot of an Aston Martin through central London was not conducive to keeping it in one piece. 

“Fuck. My. Life.” 

“Don’t pout, darling, you know what it does to me.” 

James closed the boot and locked the car, slipping the keys into his suit pocket. While Q was still gaping at him, he took the pastry box from Q’s unresisting hands and started walking in the direction of the restaurant. 

After a few seconds, his brain recovered from the Bond-induced Blue Screen of Death and Q jogged to catch up. 

“That was uncalled for.”

“You  _ were _ pouting. Don’t let this silly bet ruin our anniversary.”

Q slipped ahead to hold the door open for James. Once they were seated, the maitre d’ gestured to the box with a knowing smile. James handed it over, and they both watched him depart with the secret hope that the box would get lost somewhere in the kitchen. 

James was right. This was  _ their _ anniversary, and Q was determined to enjoy it. 

His determination to forget about the bet and enjoy the evening lasted until dessert was served. Someone in the kitchen had the bright idea to take the croquembouche out of the box and serve it on a tray. Unfortunately, that only resulted in every other patron in the restaurant side-eying Q’s disaster as it passed.

And it  _ was _ a disaster. 

The pastry, already soggy, had gone a sickly greyish colour. The crystallized caramel looked the opposite of appetizing, and clearly hadn’t done a good job at sticking the profiteroles together. Then, when he went to take a tentative bite into one, Q discovered that the filling was  _ still frozen. _

His phone vibrated in his pocket. 

Q sighed. There was only one person who would text his personal mobile tonight.

_ What the fuck is that?  _

Apparently, Bill’s chef friend had sent him a picture. If anything, the squashed, sad mound of choux pastry looked worse on the screen than it did in person. 

_ It’s called a croquembouche, you twat.  _

Q jabbed the send button before looking up from his phone to see James discreetly wiping his mouth, smothering a laugh. A glance at his plate showed that he had taken an even smaller bite than Q. 

Why wasn’t James more disappointed? Didn’t he realise what was at stake?!

They were  _ so  _ fucked. 

_ I hope you like The Lion King. _


	4. Halloween

In the two weeks since their anniversary, James had seemed remarkably calm about the bet. Whereas Q had practically jumped out of his skin every time Bill wandered into Q branch, James remained totally unruffled. In Q’s defence, aside from the one incident with 003 last week, Bill had been  _ whistling _ songs from The Lion King every time he came by. Q thought he might soon develop a Pavlovian flight response to Hakuna Matata. 

“ _ James!  _ We are about to  _ slow dance _ to a bloody Disney love song in front of  _ all of our colleagues! _ Why do you not care?!”

Q, perpetually late home from work, was rushing around trying to get ready. He had fumbled through a quick shower, tussled with his underwear and was now fighting a losing battle with his pumpkin-patterned tie.

James, the smug bastard, was already dressed. Leaning casually in the doorway in that  _ delicious-dreadful-distracting-dangerous _ skeleton suit and looking like he’d stepped right out of Q’s fantasies. 

It was  _ not _ helping Q’s dexterity. Or his frustration.

“ _ Q,” _ James started, placatingly. “It’s not exactly the lion’s den. These people are our colleagues. Some of them are even our  _ friends. _ ” 

“Our  _ very deadly _ friends!” 

Q huffed, undoing the mangled knot of his tie for the umpteenth time. With an amused chuckle and a shake of his head, James stepped away from the doorframe and towards him. Q relaxed as James gave him a peck on the forehead and gently took the tie from his fingers.

“You know damn well that you and I will be the deadliest people in that room.” 

Slowly and methodically, James began looping the tie through itself over and over again in a -

“That’s not a Windsor knot.”

“There are  _ other _ knots, you know.” Keeping his attention firmly on the tie, James continued as though Q hadn’t interrupted him. “And  _ aside _ from being the deadliest people there, our colleagues respect us. That isn’t going to change because of one dance. In fact, half of the nosy bastards you employ in Q branch-”

“Hey!”

“- are probably so desperate to see that we  _ aren’t _ really androids without an emotion chip that they’ll be too busy gaping to even  _ listen _ to which song it is.” James finished doing… whatever he was doing with Q’s tie, and stepped back to admire his handiwork. “There, much better.”

Q glanced down at the fancy criss-cross knot. 

“Two years together, and you still have hidden depths.” 

James smirked.

“Well, I  _ am _ an international man of mystery, Q. I have to remain mysterious.” He waggled his eyebrows exaggeratedly, making Q laugh. “Although the real mystery here is what on earth possessed you to buy an orange suit.”

“It’s  _ pumpkin _ , you heathen.” Q sniffed haughtily. “Some of us like having suits in colours that aren’t black, grey or blue. Besides, it’s Halloween. I was hardly going to go in  _ fancy dress _ when I knew you’d be in a suit, and if we both went as skeletons that would be overkill.” 

“Well, I for one look forward to getting this bet over with, so that I can bring you home and get you out of that monstrosity. Preferably forever.” 

Q flushed. He knew James didn’t  _ really _ hate the suit, because he’d been with Q when he bought it. That didn’t mean he couldn’t look forward to James disposing of it later. 

“Come on, then. The sooner we get there, the sooner it will be over.” 

It was not “soon over”. 

Bill seemed determined to drag this out as long as possible. Dressed as a wizard in long, flowing robes, he was being unbearably smug. Even Eve kept giggling every time she passed them. Everyone else, not in on the joke, just thought she had gone a bit too hard on the punch. 

It was a long evening. Every time a new song started, Q froze like a rabbit in headlights, expecting  _ this _ to be the moment of truth. Every time he realised it wasn’t, he sagged. As the songs passed with no sign of Disney, he grew even more tense. No amount of drinks or conversation could distract him. 

When James excused himself from the conversation Q was having with M about the political climate in China, Q just assumed he was going to get them a top up. When he returned empty handed, Q frowned.

“May I have this dance?”

_ Oh, God.  _

This was it. 

_ “Now?” _ Q hissed.

“I was tired of waiting. You were getting too anxious. Come on.”

“This is a request for James and Q,” came the DJ’s voice over the microphone. The DJ was actually Mike from accounting. 

Q froze.

Bill, he noticed, looked disgruntled.

James took Q gently by the hand and pulled him onto the dancefloor. Q didn’t need to look around to know that every eye was on them. Two years together and they had  _ never _ danced in public.

Then they were in the middle of the dancefloor. James kept hold of Q’s hand, resting the other on Q’s waist. On autopilot, Q laid his hand on James’s shoulder. James leaned in to whisper in his ear. Clearly, Q’s internal panic was showing on his face.

“Relax. Follow my lead. It’s just one dance.”

The introduction started, and James began swaying them slowly. Q was so focused on not stepping on his toes that it took him good 30 seconds to realise-

“This isn’t the Disney version! It isn’t even the Elton John version.”

“Nope.” James grinned. “Piano and cello cover. I did my research. No words, therefore minimal soppiness. Why do you think I got in there before Tanner could?” 

Q’s steps faltered as he stared into those smiling blue eyes. The thought of James listening to multiple versions of the same terrible song just to find the one that would make Q less embarrassed. James requesting the song on their own terms because he’d seen how anxious Q was getting. 

Q had never loved him more. 

Before he could second-guess himself, Q leaned in for a kiss. Of course, almost as soon as James had responded, pulling Q in to hold him closer, someone wolf-whistled. Q was about 90% sure it was Eve. He made a mental note to replace her favourite pen with one that didn’t work. 

When they parted, Q barely had time to react before James led him into a dip. He did his level best  _ not _ to flail, but the bark of laughter James let out suggested that he had not succeeded. Once he had righted himself with a chuckle of his own, he whacked James lightly on the shoulder. The bastard looked the opposite of contrite, merely grinning wider, and Q realised what James had been trying to do: make Q stop concentrating on everyone  _ else _ in the room and just have fun. 

They continued like that for the rest of the song, laughing, shuffling and swaying in a clumsy, unchoreographed dance. It was hardly what anyone would expect from smooth, suave James Bond, who probably knew how to do a Viennese waltz blindfolded. This was the James Q saw at home, and it was perfect. He no longer cared about all the eyes on them, about Bill and their stupid bet. He was too busy focusing on the man in front of him, who only had eyes for Q. 

As the song came to an end, Q impulsively lifted their joined hands and went in for a twirl. The delighted grin James gave him was more than worth the smattering of giggles he heard across the room. When the last notes ended, they came to a halt. James bowed slightly, bringing Q’s hand up to his lips, kissing him lightly on the knuckles, and let him go. Q could feel himself grinning from ear to ear. 

They were too busy looking into each other’s eyes that neither one noticed Bill’s approach.

“Why is it that I won the bet, but I feel like you two came out on top?” 

Although Bill made a show of looking put-out, Q could see him hiding a grin of his own. 

“Maybe it’s just because you can feel the love tonight,” James responded with exaggerated innocence, making Q and Bill groan at his terrible joke. 

“And on  _ that _ note, I need another drink,” Bill gestured to his empty glass. “Well played, Bond. Almost makes up for the insult to Bake Off that was Q’s croquembouche. Enjoy the rest of your night, the pair of you. And for the love of all that is holy, Q, please do not  _ ever _ attempt to bake again.” 

Q briefly considered looking affronted but honestly? He had no intention of going near a sack of flour anytime soon. 

“So, now what?” Q asked, as James led them away from the dance floor. Neither man had any desire to stick around for Thriller. 

“ _ Now _ ,” James said, pulling Q close to whisper in his ear, “I get to take you home and find out what the  _ pumpkin _ turns into at midnight.”


End file.
